Art
by Linndechir
Summary: Beauty like this was not made to be admired from afar; like music, it should be tasted, felt, smelt, devoured." Landa/Hellstrom.


**Art**

Landa wasn't sure if he had ever been so soaked in his entire life. So much snow was rare in Paris, and it had soon enough started to melt again, turning the streets into baths of icy mud, completed today by torrential rain. They had spent the entire day somewhere in the French countryside looking for traces of a resistance group that was reputedly hiding an influential communist leader, and were both soaked to the bones. Landa felt as if he had jumped into a swimming pool of ice water in his full uniform; even their leather coats and boots hadn't been able to withstand so much water.

Hellstrom was spitting out a stream of curses, unusually vulgar even for him, while getting out of his drenched boots, coat, jacket and pullover; Landa followed his example, but his eyes were on his young colleague. Hellstrom's health was quite fragile; he wasn't exactly weak, but he didn't respond very well to harsh weather. Landa still remembered last winter, when Hellstrom had spent an entire month in bed, his body wracked by fever. It was not something he wanted to see repeated, and not only because he valued the major's assistance more than any other subordinate's.

Dressed only in his - equally soaked - shirt and trousers Landa lit a fire in the salon and put several blankets and pillows in front of the fireplace, before he got a few towels from the bathroom. He undressed completely, quickly rubbed himself dry and slipped into a dressing gown, not bothering with more.

"Get out of these clothes, Dieter, you'll catch your death," he said when he stepped out of the bathroom, towels in hand. Hellstrom glared a little at him, but obeyed. After all, it wasn't as if Landa hadn't already seen him naked before, countless times. Landa was almost unpleasantly busy, hanging up their uniforms to let them dry, but Hellstrom was quite glad he didn't have to take care of anything.

For once Landa didn't allow himself to take the time to stare at Hellstrom's pale body; the boy's shivering was an unmistakeable reminder that he had to get him warm again. Hellstrom was unbearable when he was sick - not whiny, no, but positively aggressive - and Landa really didn't want to spoil his wonderful time in Paris by dealing with a grumpy assistant or, worse, with an incompetent replacement if Hellstrom fell seriously ill. He wrapped Hellstrom into a big towel and, one arm around his shoulders, led him into the salon.

"You're shivering like a leaf in the wind, Dieter," he commented, and before Hellstrom could misunderstand he added quickly, "If you think that I will grant you sick-leave _again_ you're wrong, young man."

Hellstrom muttered something under his breath, and for once Landa was quite glad that he didn't catch it. He wasn't in the mood to reprimand Hellstrom for his insolence.

The fire was starting to burn nicely, already radiating warmth into the cold room. Landa carefully rubbed Hellstrom dry, first his body, then the messy hair with a second towel. Hellstrom didn't complain, although he didn't look too happy either, and Landa refused to question his own concerned behaviour. Sometimes Hellstrom behaved like a child - irresponsible, neglecting his health, overworking himself. Landa hadn't been too surprised when Hellstrom had told him in a private conversation a while ago that there was no one he admired more than the _Chef_, _Obergruppenführer_ Reinhard Heydrich, who was known both for his occasional recklessness and his obsession with his work.

Well, Landa didn't know who took care of the _Chef _when he behaved like an irresponsible, stubborn child, but when Hellstrom needed to be taken care of, Landa was the one to do it. Especially if it implied having a naked, shivering Hellstrom in his arms, a pleasure that nobody else should ever be granted.

"I'm fine," Hellstrom grumbled, teeth clattering. Landa simply ignored him, and put the unresisting body down onto one of the big pillows, replacing the towel with a big, thick blanket. Still frowning, Hellstrom finally gave up and pulled the blanket closer around him.

Once more it struck Landa how beautiful the young _Sturmbannführer_ was: bright red cheeks in a white face, pale lips that were begging to be warmed with kisses. The moist hair was a mess, sticking up in all different directions, he looked like a boy who had been playing in the snow all day - and in a way he had, except that Hellstrom's games of hide and seek usually ended in a Gestapo prison for those who were hiding, but who were eventually always found. As he started to warm up a little, the annoyance about the cold was replaced with the familiar, satisfied smirk of a job well done.

Landa sat down next to him and, more out of politeness than anything else, started a conversation about their case today, about what they had found out and their plans for future procedures, but he had trouble concentrating. It was a shame to think that Hellstrom was naked under the blanket, all pale and available, cool skin just waiting to be warmed by worshiping hands and an equally eager mouth. Landa was a man who appreciated beauty, who wanted not only to see it, but to touch it, feel it, experience it. For him sex wasn't even so much about the satisfaction of basic needs - his hand was very well able to relieve the pressure - but about the appreciation, the experience of beauty. He was no artistic man himself - he could only consume literature, paintings, he could only look at them, and while he enjoyed it, he could not become one with them. He played the cello quite well, but not with the same virtuosity as Hellstrom played the piano. Hellstrom had once said that playing an instrument was very much like sex, equally arousing, equally satisfying, that the burning heat in his fingers and the emotional completion after playing one of his favourite sonatas felt very much like sexual afterglow, but Landa was always too busy focusing on technical difficulties to experience the same. For him, sex was the only way to become truly one with a piece of art, to be part of it, to be more than just an onlooker. And what piece of art was more beautiful than the ones given by nature, what was more enticing than the living, breathing unity of both form and content, more perfect than even in the greatest novel or painting, what could be more beautiful than a human being, no matter if man or woman, as exquisite, as intelligent, as complex as his Dieter? Beauty like this was not made to be admired from afar; like music, it should be tasted, felt, smelt, devoured until it filled every fibre of one's body and soul.

"Are you feeling better?" Landa asked when Hellstrom's dry explanation of the administrative difficulties of their future plans came to an end. Landa didn't care to discuss their work any longer, all the less since he had nothing to add; Hellstrom had already taken every arising problem into account.

The corners of Hellstrom's mouth quirked upwards in this strange half-smile of his, and he nodded a little, his expression softening. Their eyes met, then Hellstrom looked away, and Landa knew him well enough to recognise the little gesture as the major's uniquely unwilling way to thank Landa. It was why they got along so well - they both recognised intuitively the boundaries and limits of their playful, dangerous relationship, and while they broke them occasionally - where would the fun be if they didn't? - they also knew when it was better to respect them. Hellstrom spared himself the embarrassment of thanking him, and Landa the trouble to downplay his concern as pragmatic egoism.

Landa decided that he had given Hellstrom enough time to wallow in grumpiness, and sat down next to him, pushing the blanket aside a little to embrace the naked body. Hellstrom gratefully rubbed himself against the warmth, burying his face against Landa's neck and sighing happily against the warm skin when those soft, but strong hands began to slide over his skin.

The fire had warmed the room to a pleasant heat, and Landa was all too happy to get rid of the blanket entirely, ignoring the muttered protest and pushing Hellstrom down. Pale skin against the dark, decadently soft silk, a model that every painter would have craved to paint, and yet not the greatest picture would have lived up to reality. Landa leant down and kissed the almost hairless chest, but he was stopped short when one of Hellstrom's feet brushed his bare calf, so cold that Landa flinched a little.

He sat up again and gently took one of these elegant feet in his hands, touching them curiously. He had never noticed how beautiful Hellstrom's feet were, as slender and graceful as his hands, with long toes and even nails, blue veins shimmering through velvety, almost transparent skin. And still freezing cold.

Hellstrom gave him a confused look, but Landa was too distracted to notice. And there he had thought that he knew Hellstrom's body, that he had already kissed and worshiped every perfect spot; how could he have overlooked this? Hellstrom's slender, almost thin leg bent gracefully when Landa let the foot rest on his own thigh, rubbing it with careful fingers to warm it. It never ceased to amaze him how a brilliant, cold, steely mind like Hellstrom's could reside in such a frail, boyish body, and yet at the same time it only seemed to be a fitting shell for such a beautiful intellect.

He let go almost reluctantly of the first foot, and an unexpected shiver ran though him when those long toes brushed his groin for a second, with nothing but the thin fabric of the dressing gown in between. Landa swallowed hard, and he was quite relieved that he was not prone to blushing when his eyes met Hellstrom's, narrowed in amused suspicion. Landa knew it wouldn't help to distract him, but he still picked up the other foot to warm it as well, telling himself that he simply wanted to finish what he had started.

But touching had never been enough for him, he found himself bending down ever so slowly until his lips brushed Hellstrom's ankle, his tongue flicked out to taste the smooth skin, leaving a moist trail on its way downwards, all along one blue vein to his toes, slipping in between the two biggest, even sucking on one toe for a bit. He wanted to rub his face against it, and not only his face, for that matter, his groin as well … his semen on the white skin was the only thing that could improve the picture, he already saw himself licking it off again when his fantasies were rather rudely interrupted.

"Hans?" He could _hear_ the frown, but it was the use of his first name that made him shudder. Hellstrom used either his rank or, when they were in a more intimate mood, his last name, and the self-assured use of his first name could only mean one thing. He looked up into blue eyes, as pale as everything else about the major, and mirrored Hellstrom's movement when the younger man sat up slowly.

His fingers were still resting on Hellstrom's foot, unmoving and unresisting when it escaped him, nudging his groin for a second before Hellstrom lifted his leg a little until his foot came to rest on Landa's shoulder. With surprising nimbleness he pushed the already half-open dressing gown aside, and Landa moaned when the foot touched his bare skin. The moan turned into a surprised gasp, though, when Hellstrom's foot moved to his chest and suddenly pushed him down onto his back, keeping him there with slight pressure.

"You like that, don't you?" Hellstrom virtually purred, and if there had been any doubt about where this was going, it was erased by his use of the intimate "Du". "Who would have thought? The famous Hans Landa kissing my feet … _I_ like that."

Landa gulped and opened his mouth for some long-winded, eloquent explanation, something about the appreciation of artistic beauty, but he was stopped short when Hellstrom stretched his leg a little until his toes touched Landa's lips, hushing him. Defeated, and willingly so, Landa gave up and kissed them.

It didn't matter what Hellstrom would think of it, what his arrogance and vanity would make of this apparent gesture of submission. What mattered was only that Landa got what he wanted, that he would meld into this perfect piece of art, that he would be part of it and not just a silent, meaningless admirer. He sighed in blissful anticipation when Hellstrom pulled back his foot and straddled him only a few moments later, leaning over him with a promising smirk on his face.

Some art was not made to be put on a pedestal and admired from a distance. How was he supposed to understand art, to feel it, unless he allowed himself to be invaded, conquered, changed by it? If this was defeat, Hans Landa never wanted to be victorious again.


End file.
